Is there any hope for Tyler to return? Julie Plec: Tyler had to leave in the same way Katherine had to leave. When Klaus puts his mark on you, you're pretty f---ed. So we do not have any plans to bring him back until there is a resolution to his Klaus problem and with Katherine it took her out for two years. Tyler does appear in one episode [this season], but it's not his "return."

When the show returns, it seems Caroline and Elena might go head-to-head.Plec: Caroline in her darkest day has never been anything but a fixer, and her efforts to fix Elena and try to get her on the right track are not going to go over so well. These girls are peers and best friends, but one of their behaviors has changed, so it's a real world paradigm of high school friendships, with one friend getting out of control and what you try to do about it and how they respond to you.

What can we expect from Caroline and Klaus' relationship?Plec: We haven't seen the end of the strange and somewhat perverse and beautiful and horrific and amazing and awful dynamic between Caroline and Klaus. Even if the spin-off does happen and we have two shows, I don't predict that that would be the end of that relationship.

Some people haven't loved the direction that Bonnie's character has gone this season. What can you say about her future? Plec: I think everyone has an opinion about Bonnie. Some love her, some hate her, some love to hate her, some defend her with everything they have and some yawn and say, "Who cares?" She's one character that never had one singular point of view from the fan base. But for us she has always been the one who's caught in between what's right and what's wrong and what her heritage calls for [and] what she wants to do in the name of her friends. Now she's under extreme manipulation by Shane or Silas, whatever you want to call him right now, yet she's really just being driven by a desperate desire to bring Jeremy back from the dead. So he's exploiting that emotional drive she has and taking it to the next level and I don't even know if Bonnie right now is aware of how insane she is! Her mind has a very clear drive which is, "I can bring Jeremy back."

The second half the season will be more grounded in high school. What can we expect? Plec: We just started shooting the prom episode, which is episode 19 and graduation is going to be the finale. We'll get to end the season with all of those great questions of who's going to be where, who's going to be with who, who's going to do what.

So when will we know who Elena is taking to prom? Plec: You may have to wait until someone puts up the wrong photos or I accidentally slip and say something in the press.

The Vampire Diaries returns with new episodes on Thursday, March 14 at 8/7c on The CW.